


Five times when John felt his heart sank for one reason or another

by livia_bj



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Fluff, M/M, Pre-Slash, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-21
Updated: 2012-04-21
Packaged: 2017-11-04 01:51:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,621
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/388344
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/livia_bj/pseuds/livia_bj
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One of those "five times when..." fics :)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Five times when John felt his heart sank for one reason or another

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: BBC Sherlock belongs to Moffat, Godtiss, BBC big bosses and many other people but not me. I don’t make any money with this kind of things. Sherlock and John belongs to each other.
> 
> Note: Written before S2 was aired and also published on the LiveJournal community.

1

He was awakened by a terrible noise, a sound like the creaking wheels of a truck on the street while running over a thousand cats. He blinked in confusion, disoriented for a moment. There it was again. And clearly it wasn’t a truck running over any cat: it was the annoying damn violin again. He checked the alarm clock: 3.30 A.M  
Already four nights in a row that week!

Complaining he hid his head under the pillow, though he knew it was a useless solution. And he was stupid for not having brought some earplugs earlier that evening! He tried to think of something else, but everything was useless.  
Ten minutes later he decided he'd had enough, pulled the pillow away and stood up resolutely. He opened the bedroom door and bare footed went down the stairs.  
“Sherlock!”  
The person in question was sprawled in his armchair while torturing the diabolical instrument. He looked at his flatmate for a second, almost lazily.  
“John?”  
“Stop making that noise or I am not responsible for any damage that casually happens to that violin first thing tomorrow morning.”

The detective didn’t change his face, though he held the instrument tight against him.  
“Thought you didn’t mind.”  
“Nooo. The first night I tolerate it... well, for you. The second night I found it annoying. The third night it became irritant. And tonight I can’t take it anymore! Besides, do you really know how to play it? Because I’m starting to think that you don’t and you only uses it for.... screwing with me!  
“Don’t be ridiculous.” Sherlock smiled a little.”If I wanted to screw with you, I would do it in a bed.”

John had a reply ready, he even had his mouth open, ready to carry on with the argument, but that answer left him knocked out. He blushed. Checkmate. He clenched his fists in frustration and turned around to return to his room, not daring to look back at his friend.  
“Stupid, stupid Sherlock.”  
He muttered as he got into bed with a strange feeling in the stomach. It wasn’t funny. He turned upside down. Not damn funny. He rolled to the other side. Why did Sherlock say that? Why he hadn’t answered? He just wanted to scream: another night like this and he wasn’t going to get any sleep at all. He sat up and put on the table lamp, he reached his laptop thinking about blogging something. And it was at that moment when he heard it.  
It was the violin again, but this time the infernal noise wasn’t there. It was a delightful melody, some Celtic music style. He stood.  
It seemed that Sherlock knew how to actually play the violin after all.

2

It was the strongest storm in the last few days. Thunder had already shook the windows several times. John moved his eyes away from the laptop for a second, thinking about what he was going to write next, and ended up looking at Sherlock, who was lying on the couch with his blue gown wrapped around his long body.  
He seemed unaware of the storm. Just lying there, staring at the ceiling. John frowned, sometimes he could feel the urge to getting up to check if he still had a pulse. On one hand to make sure the detective was still alive, on the other because it would give him an excuse to touch his pale neck.

The next thunder caught him off guard, the house lights went out, leaving only the glow from the laptop’s screen. John looked out the window.

“The light is gone in the whole street.” He said, needing to confirm that it wasn’t only at their flat.

Sherlock hissed a Hmmmm that could have meant anything.  
“I better light on some candles.”  
John took the laptop, using the glow to make his way to the kitchen.  
“Watch out where you put those clumsy hands of yours.”  
Sherlock’s voice sounded like beyond the grave. The doctor sighed irritated. Once he found the candles, thankfully intact, he turned off the laptop and went back to the living room. He stood in the doorframe for a moment, thinking about where to put them. He decided to seize that opportunity and as if it were the most natural thing in the world he approached the couch, left the candles on the table, and tried to move Sherlock’s legs away.  
“Fit me in.”  
Sherlock tucked his legs in, and when his friend was sat down, stretch them back over his lap. Neither of them said anything.  
“So you’re afraid of the dark and need to be near someone.”  
“I’m not afraid of dark.” The doctor cleared his throat. “But no one likes it.”  
“I like it. I am made of darkness.” It was almost a whisper.

John dared to look at him and the next second he regretted having done so, because under the candle’s light Sherlock was more beautiful than ever.  
And yet I believe that you radiate more light than any other person I have ever met  
He would have wanted to answer that. But instead he threw his head back against the couch and closed his eyes. If chasing criminals through London don’t kill him, living with Sherlock would. That man was meant to be his death in one way or another.

3

He had bought a neuroscience magazine the day before and today he couldn’t find it. It wasn’t in his room that morning, so he thought it might be at the surgery. But it wasn’t there either. So it has to be at home, somewhere.  
He rummaged through the pile of newspapers, left there weeks ago. Looked under the couch, inspected several objects that were collecting dust on the table. And frustrated, he stood in the middle of the living room, arms crossed, looking around. Due to the general disorder Sherlock might had picked it up mixed with his things.

He weighed up the pros and cons of taking a look in his room, for he was only entered there once, or rather he had looked from the door frame. Anyone could see that Sherlock rarely spent time in that part of the house; the decor was minimalist and everything was in order. Not at all like the chaos that was installed in the kitchen, the living room and even the bathroom

He put all his effort in ignoring the bed (those were silk sheets?) and he glanced at the night table. There were several magazines and a book on it. He rummaged through the magazines, none were his. So he focused on the book: Stories of London that one could never believe they are true.  
It sounded interesting, he could also read it in case he didn’t find his magazine.

He blew some dust that had accumulated on the cover and opened it looking for the index. By doing this, a paper fell at his feet. He quickly bet down to pick it up, he really didn’t want to start losing some of the detective’s personal stuff.  
Once he had the paper in his hands and examined it more closely, his heart sunk. It was a photograph of that... bitch whose name wasn’t even worth trying to pronounce.

“Married to your work. Married to your work.... Yeah, right.” He muttered in angry. “And I should believe that you’re also a nun now...”

He returned the book to its place and left the room. He wanted to beat the nearest wall. Ah, now that idea of shooting a few bullets to it didn’t seem to be so bad.  
Grabbing his coat he headed out. He wanted to be away for a few hours, and forget about the world a little bit.  
So he could either go and get drunk, which wasn’t his style, or do something more conventional like going to the cinema. He had seen ads in buses of a good science fiction film he really liked to see, even if it was all alone.

4

From the night he played the violin for real for the first time, Sherlock started doing it more often. John however was never allowed to be a direct witness. The detective started to play when the doctor was in his room and he was in the living room, or the opposite way.  
For a long time John only was allowed to listen, never to see. Every time he tried to come out of the blue, Sherlock stopped playing. Gradually, however, John began to approach to his goal: firs he could heard the music from the stairs, one step closer every day. After that, he was given the chance of hearing from the kitchen.  
The day he finally won the privilege to see Sherlock, John was watching telly, a boring evening. The dark haired man was running his experiments in the kitchen, he suddenly got up and entered the living room. The doctor didn’t even look at him, so interested he was on the program he was watching. Yet he felt his friend going back to the kitchen, and a minute later, he could hear the music from the violin.  
He froze, he was only six feet away, John only had to look through the door and he could finally see him. He swallowed, and cautiously, like if he was about to scare a little animal, he looked at Sherlock.

He was playing with his eyes open, staring at the pipettes and petri dishes. With those eyes that made John breathless; sometimes gray, sometimes green, sometimes pale blue. He played with elegance but also in a very casual way, he could have been in front of a full auditorium or at the same spot he was.  
John hardly dared to breathe, like if his presence would scared Sherlock and made him let the violin aside. So he keep on watching, enjoying, for the next fifteen minutes. Until Sherlock suddenly stopped.

“Well…” John murmured, unsure about whether or not bring the subject alive; that it was the first time he saw Sherlock directly playing.

The detective frowned, as if he just realized he wasn’t alone.

“They say that plants grow faster with music. I wanted to check if my cultures so do.”

John wondered if Sherlock was teasing him. So what he did was return his attention to telly and staying in silence as if nothing had really happened.

Since that day, Sherlock played in front of him quite often. When Mycroft came to visit (to bother, would say his brother) he asked John if it was very annoying to hear him mistreating the violin. The doctor answered that not only did Sherlock not mistreat the instrument, but also he was an excellent player.  
“Interesting.” Mycroft said.  
“Why?”  
“Sherlock never plays in front of anyone.”

And that made John Watson to feel special. Even more special than he already felt knowing that to the current date he was the closest person to Sherlock Holmes and the only one who knew him best in this world. He could reach what nobody reached, he saw what no one else could see. And yet it was a hell, to live so close to him and don’t have him they way he would like.

5

“Come on. Let me doing to you.” Sherlock insisted.  
“No.” John answered again.  
“Why?”  
“Well. Because…I’m out of training. I hardly remember how to do it.”

And he collapsed on his armchair, hoping that Sherlock would forget about it soon. Like if that could happen.  
“Automatic learnings are stored in the basal ganglia and cerebellum, they can’t be forgotten. That kind of memory is not stored in the cortex.”  
“Are you trying to teach me a lesson in medicine?”  
“I’m pointing out that the military training is almost purely an automatic process.”

John let out a sigh.

“Look, Sherlock. I won’t tie you up with any kind of armlock. Besides, it doesn’t work like that.”  
“You can be more boring than the skull sometimes.”  
“Thanks.”

The detective sunk in the couch and refused to speak in the next hour. At first John tried to convince him not to be so childish, but he finally gave up and decided to ignore him as well. When he decided to make tea, he didn’t ask if he also wanted one. So he heated water and poured into the cup, he just had turned around to find a tea bag when he felt Sherlock’s presence behind him. Suddenly the detective’s arms wrapped his body from behind.

“So, what if it’s me who ties you?”

John tried to catch his breath, not because he was suffocating but because having Sherlock glued to his body, feeling his breath so close…He was about to faint, so he tried to keep his composure.  
“You really think that I’m tied, huh?” He asked, trying to control his voice.  
“I’m taller than you. Right now I could just lift you and…”  
“Try it.”

The doctor did a thing with one leg, tangling it between Sherlock’s. The detective tried to move him but it was useless.

“Interesting.” He said, his face still attached to his friend’s ear.  
“It’s a quite effective little trick.” John cleared his throat.

Sherlock broke their weird hug.

“I want some tea too.”  
John’s legs were shaking.

“I didn’t boil enough water for both.”  
“Yes you did. You always do.”

Discreetly John collapsed in the nearest chair, not feeling his legs anymore.  
Sherlock has had to noticed him trembling, sweating, his heart pounding in his chest. It was impossible to him not to have noticed it. He buried his head in his hands.

+1

“John Watson gives me a good sensation as a future flatmate.”  
Sherlock told the skull for the first time one day.  
“I like John.”  
He told it, not many days after.  
“I am in love with John.”

He began the third conversation. Although technically the skull hadn’t answered to any of the above mentioned conversations.  
Sherlock put his fingers through its sockets and turned it around in his hands.

“Don’t judge me. I never said ours was exclusive.”

The skull gave him an open smile.  
Sherlock put it aside with a sigh. He looked around, he was going to be bored until John was at home again. He reached his phone.

Come home now (18.30)  
SH

Leave what you’re doing. This can’t wait (18.31)  
SH

John didn’t answer his messages, he said that he had the intention to save money on his phone bill that month, but it only took him half an hour to enter the flat.

“Sherlock?”

He called as he climbed the stairs. When he was at the living room he saw the dark haired man lying on his armchair. He held out his hand to the doctor.

“Help me to get up.”

John tried to stay calm.

“I hope you’re not calling me just for doing that.”  
“Yes.”  
“Sherlock!”  
“Are you doing it?”  
“No!  
“John, please, this is important. I want to show you something.”

Angry at himself for falling again in one of his friend’s traps, John approached and grabbed his hand, pulling him. When they were one in front of another, their bodies almost touching, John looked up.

“Well?”

And then Sherlock kissed him.

And John could never remember exactly how it happened, he didn’t have a picture of Sherlock’s face coming closer. His world just melted when he felt his Sherlock’s lips on his own. And though his legs barely responded, his arms did, grabbing the detective’s neck.

It wasn’t a perfect kiss, but it was their first kiss. And the kiss that made them both finally felt they were found their home


End file.
